Monetha — ICO Review

Monetha is creating a decentralized, blockchain-based payment solution with an integrated trust and reputation system, which is what differentiates it from other cryptocurrency merchant solutions such as BlockPay, Coinpayments, Coss.io, and others.

Every transaction made with Monetha will be recorded to the blockchain including the time of the transaction, product details, receiving and sending addresses, warranty conditions, delivery time, and any other relevant purchase information. The information will be hashed and available only to authorized parties, but accessible to both merchant and client on the Monetha app. Based on this information, clients and merchants will be able to rate one another, as well as file and resolve claims, all of which will also be recorded on the blockchain. Moreover, a trust rating will be assigned to every wallet address and automatically adjusted every time a transaction is made, a claim is filed or resolved, a review is written, etc. Smart contracts will automatically (algorithmically) adjust the trust rating of a merchant based on customer ratings and reviews as well as responsiveness to claims, and that of a customer based on purchase and claim history. These trust ratings will be visible to other merchants or customers. Unlike ratings in centralized marketplaces, which are not influenced by unrated or unreviewed transactions, Monetha ratings will be automatically influenced by all transactions to varying extent. And furthermore, Monetha will allow users to transfer or export their accumulated reputation to other platforms.

Being a cryptocurrency based payment solution, Monetha naturally aims to make the payment process cheaper, faster, and more efficient than it is using traditional payment gateways, by reducing the need for intermediaries. When clients choose to pay through the Monetha gateway, the purchase amount will be converted to a selected cryptocurrency in real-time and a QR code will be generated for the customer to scan and approve with their crypto-wallet. The payment will then be transferred to the merchant’s wallet in approximately 2 minutes, and converted to the merchant’s preferred fiat currency via Kraken or other exchange API. Merchants will be able to choose the fiat currency, conversion frequency, time of deposit to their bank account, and other options. Monetha will not be able to suspend, hold or prevent any transaction — permissionless transactions will be guaranteed by their smart contracts. However, in its whitepaper, Monetha says that it will screen every merchant to ensure that only valid and authentic merchants use the platform, and that it plans to include an algorithm to recognize and red-flag unusual behaviour.

For its services, Monetha will charge merchants a transaction fee of 1.5% (with no chargeback fees), of which 1/3 (0.5%) will go to a “Voucher Smart Contract” for token holders and the remaining 2/3 (1%) will go the company as revenue. The voucher smart contract will provide token holders with the ability to claim a voucher proportional to the amount of tokens that they hold, to use as a discount or gift-card when shopping with Monetha. In addition, every purchase made with Monetha will reward the customer with 0.2% of the purchase value in Monetha tokens from the loyalty program pool. Other loyalty discounts will also be available.

To date, Monetha has developed an MVP which provides merchants with a Monetha payment gateway script that can be integrated into any shopping cart or website (some scripting knowledge is required). Merchant-side functionality enabling rates, limits, and automatic exchange to local currency are still to be developed. Also, while the whitepaper provides sample workflows illustrating the purchase and claim processes and how they affect the trust rate for both parties, the number, detailed structure, and functionality of the smart contracts will be defined and finalized during development. Monetha’s stated goal for the platform’s beta version is to provide an online e-commerce payment platform which enables mobile payments in Ethereum-based cryptocurrencies, as well as to show the potential of its trust and reputation system, and to work with merchants to test and improve the solution.